“That’s— Oh no, my steam kite!” She darted toward the biggest piece of the wreckage of what remained of her aircraft — the main body that had lost its wings — and caressed it. “Aw, to let my creation suffer this injustice… I’ll be sure to bring you back and repair you

What are you treating it as? Your child? I thought in total bewilderment. It wouldn’t be weird for her to do that, still.

“Gonna take a while to gather all the wreckage… Alfredo…” Tuilë began giving instructions to Alfredo.

Alfredo, who had been following us, stepped forward and did her bidding. If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought that it was her butler, doing everything that she wished without uttering a single complaint, not that it was able to.

Seeing that she wouldn’t need my help, I said to her, “Alright then. I’mma go over there and concentrate on absorbing more source crystals.”

“Yeah, yeah. Do whatever you want.”

She didn’t even glance back at me and gestured for me not to disturb her. Typical. But that was how she was. Once she was engrossed in her work, not even a fire or an earthquake could stop her.

I strode around for a bit to look for a perfect spot and discovered a small clearing under the woods’ canopy with a medium-sized rock neatly at the side. It wasn’t totally flat, rough around the edges, but good enough for one person to sit on, so I sat cross-legged on it.

Taking a relaxing position, I put down my backpack with Luna-1 inside and ruffled the side pocket to get the needed source crystals, putting it neatly before me. By this time, only three of the original eight were remaining since I’d used the rest.

Indeed. Becoming a source evoker was more time and material-consuming than simply becoming a source enhancer. After all, I had to construct my source heart from the ground by extracting the purest kind of source energy within the source crystals. That was why I hadn’t been able to become one after these three days…

Yet, I was calm and at ease. There was this sense of lightness in my chest akin to when I was excited to play a brand-new game when I was a child. Yes. I was totally confident.

Before I began, however, I checked my status screen to compare my progress so far.

Maxim Peterson (Raymond Orton)

[…]

Source Level: Tier-1 enhancer

Source Element(s): All (basic)

Vocation(s): [All Elements] | [The Survivalist]

Stats:

* STR: E (25 → 27)

* AGI: E (24 → 27)

* VIT: E- (22 → 24)

* SRC: F+ (11 → 18)

* SPR: F (10 → 13)

Accumulation Points: 12 → 14 [E-]

It had been a while since the last time I checked my stats. Finding the numbers that kept going up as I became stronger always felt amazing. Looking at my source power, it wouldn’t be long before I stepped to Tier 1 as an evoker.

Nevertheless, it appeared that the constant use of source elements increased my SPR or spiritual power.

SPR (spiritual power)

The limit of which spiritual energy accumulated in the body and its subsequent output power in performing a Vocation. Furthermore, it also increases the synergy between other stats.

“Alright! I have to make do with these three remaining First-Order source crystals and become an evoker,” I declared. “I can’t waste more time than what I’ve done.”

If I failed, it would take me some time to gather another batch. Additionally, the faster I became stronger, the faster the source crystals gathering would be.

“Why are you so obsessed with finishing the airship within a month, anyway?”

Luna-1 lenses contracted as Lunaria asked that.

“That is…” I can’t explain to her about the mission, can I? She would think of me as crazy. Better play oblivious. “Well, you can say that I have my own way of thinking. I fear that something may happen the longer we wait.”

After all, only I could see the status screen and thus the mission. Even I wouldn’t believe it if someone told me about this thing without experiencing it firsthand.

“Mm. The sooner the better; I agree with the notion.”

Anyway, back on topic. I focused back to absorb the rest of the source crystals. To that end, I tried remembering the things that Spitzek had taught me. He once said, “To activate magic, you first must possess a good imagination, and through manipulating source energy on the air with a bowl-and-tub-analogy trick, magic can be activated,” or something like that.

Right now, I was only a step away from forming my source heart, and there were signs of me manipulating the source element as Tuilë had done with her lightning claws. It wasn’t a wrong choice to become an enhancer before I was an evoker; this made things a lot easier for me.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Having comprehended all that, I began absorbing the three source crystals one by one and directed it to my second heart — the source heart. It was a slow and meticulous process that a single mishap might cause me to fail and had to begin from scratch, but I’d asked Lunaria to keep an eye on the surroundings.

When I was on the last source crystal, the source heart in my body finally condensed together and started pounding just like my second heart. A sudden desperate desire to suck all the energy around me arose, and my body, almost instinctively, began frantically taking in all the source energy in the air, directing them into my source heart.

A powerful sensation, as if I could control the string-like energy in the air, appeared. I corresponded to the feeling, and now, it finally submitted to my will, servilely complying with every command I gave.

“Successfully becoming a source evoker is signified by the vacuum of source energy around the said individual; you have shown obvious signs of that,” Lunaria confirmed — through the wise words of Spitzek.

Making a confident smile, I manipulated the source energy to gather in my hand and turned them into a Pyro element. A blazing hot fire blazed right above my hand, and when I switched to Anemo element, it turned into a swirling wind.

Further with the testing, I coated my right arm with the Anemo element. The wind swirled wildly around my arm like a mini tornado that could sweep anything. I figured that it was possible to coat my whole body with source elements, although the consumption of source energy was tremendous to do that; I probably wouldn’t last ten seconds doing that.

As for magic spells? They would come naturally as I understood more of my power — that was what both Spitzek and Tuilë had told me. After all, the power of source evoker was more of a manipulation of source energy and conjuring them outside the body in elemental form.

Satisfied, I dispersed the source element by punching the air toward the forest. The swirling wind blasted open a fish-sized hole in a tree ten meters away and left a smaller hole for the next few trees behind it.

“Such power… But I’m a little tired. Phew…” Using my source power like that put a strain on my body… I truly couldn’t use it often and in such a brazen way. Ineffective.

Now, to see how much I’d improved…

Maxim Peterson (Raymond Orton)

[…]

Source Level: Tier-1 enhancer | Tier-1 evoker

Source Element(s): All (basic)

Vocation(s): [All Elements] | [The Survivalist]

Stats:

* STR: E (27)

* AGI: E (27)

* VIT: E- (24)

* SRC: E- (18 → 21)

* SPR: F (13)

Accumulation Points: 14 → 15 [E-]

Yahoo! I did it! Having an assurance by being informed by [Identification] was always the best feeling.

However, dejection came after the adrenaline had passed. All of these improvements came with the cost of using up all my source crystals. I was spending them at the same pace I was gathering them; how would I gather a thousand of them then?

“Hah… in terms of source crystals, we have no source crystals.”

It was then that Tuilë promptly arrived and waved at me. “Hiya there, Maxxy. What are you grinning silly for? Ooh, ooh, you’re making a breakthrough just now? I can feel it from a distance away.”

“Uh-huh! Look.” I showed her the swirling wind above my palm.

“Huh? Hmmmmm…” She poked her cheek while closing her eyes. “That’s odd.”

“Something’s wrong?”

“Your source power, how do I put it… Um, it’s colorless. Well, it’s typically without color when someone is intentionally suppressing their powers, but it’ll always have a color of their respective element when they’re using it. You know ‘bout that, right?”

“Sure…” Well, of course, it was through the power of my Vocation, after all. “By the way, what about the steam kite?”

The sun was atop our heads at this time, the sunlight passing through the gaps of the canopy and shining on my face; I sure had spent quite a few hours just making my breakthrough. As such, I didn’t think spending more time dilly-dallying would be wise.

“It’s done — all the wreckage has been collected until no stone has been left unturned. To be frank, we’ve been waiting for you like for an hour by now.”

Lunaria chimed in, “That’s true. Four hours. You have been taking your time doing this for four hours on end.” No need for a repeat, I can hear it clearly…

“Oof, sorry for that. Wasting your time when you can use it to repair the airship.”

“It’s no biggie, no biggie at all. I’ve been scavenging for food in the meantime. Come, it’s ready for the picking.” Tuilë beckoned at me toward the steam kite’s location.

With a small leap, I got off the rock and went after Tuilë, not forgetting to bring my backpack. Although I was still curious to test my new power, I could do that in the mine when gathering source crystals. Nothing beat the sense of doing two or three things at once — a habit brought from my world.

There was a small campfire along with Alfredo there. It was sitting aimlessly while holding on to the broken steam kite and its pieces, and as for the food that she had made, it was nothing more than six skewers made of mushrooms, some random vegetables, and some unknown meat. It was golden brown in color and looked tasty at first glance.

“Sit anywhere you like,” was what she said, but there was practically nothing to sit on safe from dirt on the ground.

Not bothering with the tiny details, I sat down on dead tree leaves that I laid on the ground. It wasn’t at the season when deciduous trees shed their leaves, but there were bound to be dead leaves here and there piled up.

“Here. It’s piping hot, so watch out.” She gave me two while also taking two for herself, the rest was placed on the campfire for Alfredo to stare at.

“These skewers contain nutritious ingredients, and no harmful elements were found. Safe for human consumption,” Lunaria whispered, unheard by Tuilë who was feverishly munching the skewers.

“Are you sure this thing is safe to consume, Lunaria?”

As if her pride had been hurt, she replied, “If you can’t trust me, then don’t ever trust me again.”

“Uh… Okay, I’ll buy it this once.”

I inspected one of the skewers with some skepticism before taking a small bite after finding nothing out of the ordinary in it. It wasn’t as tasteless as I’d initially thought, as it had a mild earthly taste. The meat was also delicious and tasted like chicken, similar to chicken wings.

“Say, what meat is this?”

I hadn’t eaten chicken in a long, long time; I doubted there would be any in Aquarine. To maximize our time, we mostly ate what was available at Tuilë’s house: peanuts, wild vegetables, and mushrooms, among other vegetarian diets. Despite its wider variety than solely eating compressed energy bars, it wasn’t a satisfying meal for someone like me who was mildly addicted to fast food.

I remembered that Raymond’s village, this body’s original owner, raised chickens. So at least there was bound to be some if I could find similar shelters scattered across the Crimson Fogland.

“Oh, it’s from a frog I hunted from a small pond over there.” Tuilë pointed to a certain part of the forest.

“Frog… It’s frog meat, huh… Say what—?! Ble-urp…” I refrained from throwing up on the spot. It wasn’t that frogs were inedible, I just hadn’t tasted one, and it was so sudden…

To think that that one simple question would make raise another regret.